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As I read this article, I couldn’t help but thinking about some of the challenges faced by intermarried couples. See, some choose to expose their children to both religions, allowing them to decide for themselves which, if any, they want to adopt for themselves. What researchers have found, is that in such cases, the children choose the neither option. Certainly, this can be attributed to the fact that in most cases, the parents weren’t very religious to begin with. However, it has also been noted that since the parents weren’t so committed to their respective religions, the children never see a reason to, uh… be more Catholic than the Pope so to speak.

See, when parents abdicate their role to lead their children, the children don’t get lead. The same applies to contemporary Judaism I suppose. With much of the organized Jewish community tripping over itself to pander to young Jews’ desire for self expression, I feel much of Jewish leadership has abdicated it’s leadership role and in its stead young Jews are presented with a dizzying and often confusing array of choices that the vast majority demonstrably and simply continue to choose to opt out of.

So yes. Judaism was never designed to be a monolith. We do indeed have a unique message to share with the world. Stepping back from our previous generations’ desire to be normal and accepted is probably a good idea. However, lets not lose sight of our fundamental values. Lets not lose sight of the responsibility to educate and guide the young and lets not allow ourselves to get too caught up in demographics, marketing points and pandering.

Newer isn’t always better – are we so full of hubris to believe that we can out innovate God? I don’t think so…

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